Living by the Sword

As I wend toward my conclusion on the series where I note that the US is overdue for some divine retribution, or as one minister put it, “the chickens coming home to roost,” I thought I would talk about military spending. 

Romney has been surprising me lately with some of his statements. He has announced that he wants to increase defense spending to 4% of GDP, gross domestic product. What makes this statement surprising is that right now we spend 4.7%. Limiting defense spending to 4% actually makes a lot of sense, but this is another example of Romneyspeak. (We will leave Obamaspeak for another day.) What Romney has done is to ignore the part of our national defense that is spent in other departments—the Energy department pays for nuclear weapons, the CIA budget, and the Veterans department for example. In fact I would guess that if all the hidden parts of the defense budget were brought to the light and consolidated it would be more than 4.7% of GDP. 

Jesus said this about the sword in Matt 26:

^50-51 Jesus said, “Friend, why this charade?”

Then they came on him—grabbed him and roughed him up. One of those with Jesus pulled his sword and, taking a swing at the Chief Priest’s servant, cut off his ear.

^52-54 Jesus said, “Put your sword back where it belongs. All who use swords are destroyed by swords. Don’t you realize that I am able right now to call to my Father, and twelve companies—more, if I want them—of fighting angels would be here, battle-ready? But if I did that, how would the Scriptures come true that say this is the way it has to be?”

I have heard similar things said in seriousness. We need to be careful not to over-interpret what Jesus is saying here. Jesus was not a pacifist. There is a time and a place for self-defense at the individual, and yes, even the national level. What he said, based on the King James, has become a proverb for the English culture, “Those that live by the sword, die by the sword.” That is what Jesus was saying. 

If you are a Christian, do you agree with Jesus that those that live by the sword will die by the sword? If you do, then ask yourself, “Does the US live by the sword?” Look at the chart at the top of this blog post. No—meditate on it. Is 46% of all worldwide military expenditures an indication that the US does live by the sword? 

You might argue that it is needed to fight the Soviet menace. Oh wait, there is no Soviet menace. (If you want to understand why Romney is so bellicose against Russia, it is to justify the enormous defense spending he advocates. The Russian Federation cannot even control the Ukraine anymore!)  You might argue that the defense budget is needed to fight terrorists. How many aircraft carriers does al Qaida have? 

President Eisenhower said this in his farewell address: 

I suppose he could have been wrong. But looking at our situation today, it seems he could not have been more right. This is one reason why I refuse to vote for either Romney or Obama—they are both toadies of the “military industrial complex.” 

I ask you to meditate on what Jesus said. If the US lives by the sword, it will die by the sword. 

For those interested, here is the full Eisenhower speech.